Criminal Law Blog

DCCA: Barring notices cannot bar DCHA residents and household members from areas that their leases permit them to access.



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Foster v. U.S., 17-CM-994 (decided November 7, 2019)

  • Holding: Evidence that appellant violated a notice purporting to bar him from three out of six buildings in the DCHA development where he lived with his mother was insufficient to establish the crime of unlawful entry, where appellant’s mother’s lease apparently granted appellant access to the entire development, including all common areas and grounds associated with all buildings. Although special police officers testified that the development had been subdivided into three-building sections for purposes of issuing and enforcing barring notices, and that appellant had been barred from the section where he did not reside, the alleged subdivision was not reflected in appellant’s mother’s lease agreement, which listed appellant as a household member and which was further binding on DCHA. Accordingly, the government failed to prove that appellant was an “unauthorized person” subject to barring on the property listed in the notice, i.e., that he was not a “member of [a] resident’s household” on the property in question. 14 DCMR § 9600.2.
Read the full opinion here.

A copy of this post has been added to Elements/Sufficiency of the Evidence section of The (Early) Year in Review (Part 3).

- WCC